Destination: Taiwan
Duration: 13 Days 13 Nights (Nov 18~Dec
01, 2015)
Day 11: Taipei (Shifen, Pingxi &
Jiufen)
We
started our day by utilizing our breakfast coupon for breakfast spread in
Tomorrow Hotel (明日大饭店). Well, I think tomorrow we would
just use the coupon at 7-11 instead since the food was really not that
alluring.
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| Our Breakfast Coupon from Hotel |
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| The Breakfast Spread - not that good! |
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| Such Irony! Chicken as a Mascot! |
After
our disappointing breakfast, we went on to take MRT to Ruifang Station (瑞芳火车站) and continued through Pingxi line (平溪线) to Shifen (十分). The Pingxi line train was super
cramped since it was Sunday and the train was not frequent (only once every
hour). Since there were lots of tourists swarming into Shifen, we kind of laid
back and took our time to take picture in Shifen Station (十份车站). They use the term “shifen” (十分 = loose translation: Perfect) to the fullest here! There is a
“Shifen Xingfu” (十份幸福= perfect
bliss) post box and
shop here… =P
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| At RuiFang Station |
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| The Pingxi Line Train |
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| The Perfect Bliss Postbox! |
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| The Perfect Bliss Station! |
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| The Railway! |
Shifen
is proclaimed to be the place where flying lantern (放天燈) is originated. No one was releasing the flying lantern yet when
we arrived though thus we walked over to Jing An Suspension Bridge (靜安吊橋) to take some photos.
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| Hit me with a TRAIN! |
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| The originator of Flying Lantern |
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| At Jing An Suspension Bridge |
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| Quite a Nice View... |
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| Let's JUMP! |
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| At the Entrance.. or was it at the Exit? LOL! |
After
that, there was another long walk under the scorching sun to our next
destination – Shifen waterfall (十份瀑布).
The verdict? The view was nice with waterfall & greenery and all – BUT it
was definitely TOO FAR to walk from the station. It took us like 20-30mins one
way! So if you are pressed for time – skip this!
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| Hello Doggie! |
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| It's a long long way! |
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| More reminder on the originator of Flying Lantern! =P |
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| Are we there yet?! |
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| At least this is a beautiful backdrop! |
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| Finally inside the Park |
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| Here is the Waterfall! |
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| Cute Doggie! |
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| Long way back! |
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| Still walking! |
Since we
spent too much time walking to and from the waterfall, we managed to miss out
our train. LOL!!! Thus we ended up staying an hour longer there to explore the
Shifen old street (十份老街) and took pictures of flying lantern. We bought this
famous rice wrapped in chicken wing (溜哥炭烤雞翅包飯) and it was quite nice.
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| Towards the Old Street |
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| To be Smarter and to be slim! I want too! |
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| Which direction should we go? |
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| Perhaps towards the Perfect Bliss ticket! |
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| Queueing for food! |
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| Rice Wrapped in Chicken Wing |
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| The Rice! |
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| Shifen Train Station |
Our train
finally arrived and we had to suffer another bout of cramped train again to
reach Pingxi (平溪). We simply explored around the old
street (平溪老街) and bought this special Pingxi
Arrow (平溪箭头). It was
basically a deep fried giant sausage made of pork, chicken, prawn and another
gazillions of stuffs and it was really YUMMY! The queue was definitely worth
it! =P
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| Lots of people at Pingxi Old Street |
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| Long Queue everywhere! |
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| Apparently this is an iconic view in Pingxi - especially when there is a train passing by! |
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| Look at this! A sign of Pingxi! |
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| The Sewer Cover! |
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| This is out from Pingxi Old Street though - must turn back! |
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| Standing right below the railway! |
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| Getting our Pingxi Arrow! |
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| Those are HUGE!!! |
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| YUMMY!!! |
We took the
train again back to RuiFang Station (瑞芳火车站)
and the sky was already getting dark even though it was before 5pm. Btw, in case you are in Pingxi and want to go back to Ruifang but the next train is to QingTong (箐桐), take it! QingTong is the last station and the train will make a U-turn to Pingxi again. You will get a seat in this case and skip the crazy crowd!
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| Look at the Crowd!!! |
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| At the Station! |
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| Waiting waiting... |
By the time
we reached Ruifang, the sky has already turned dark! UGH! We went on to take a
bus to JiuFen (九份) – the bus station was NOT the one
in front of the train station. Once out of train station, cross over the road
and walk to your left! It was like 100-150m away. The bus drove pass us when we
were walking towards the station and we had to RUN all the way there.
Thankfully there were long queue thus the bus was still there.
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| We make it!!! |
I
guess the biggest regret was we never had the chance to take picture in JiuFen
during daytime thus missing out lots of picturesque shot from the top. Anyway,
Jiufen was a really charming village with LOTs of stairs and it did look beautiful
at night with all the lanterns and lights.
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| Finally at Jiufen! |
The
1st thing we did after reaching jiufen? EAT!!! There was this famous
fish ball shop – Uncle Fish Ball (魚丸伯仔)
right at our path so we just walked in and ordered the fish ball soup (魚丸湯) and firm beancurd with meat (豆干包). The fish ball texture was really
firm and kind of familiar to squid ball. The firm beancurd was okay – nothing
too extraordinary. When we were eating halfway, we accidentally saw other
people ordering this dry glass noodle (乾冬粉) which looked so alluring. We ordered one too and
it was definitely the best decision EVER!!! The dry glass noodle was DELISH!!!
The glass noodle was cooked to perfection and along with some ShaCha sauce (沙茶酱), spring
onion & deep fried small onion – it was beyond delicious!!!
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| Uncle Fish Ball |
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| Chilli & Pepper! |
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| Firm Beancurd Box |
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| Fish Ball Soup |
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| Dried Glass Noodle - DO NOT MISS THIS!!! |
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| This is the Shop name! Don't miss this!!! |
We then stopped to get ourselves more foods – this
time taro ball dessert from Lai Ah Po (賴阿婆竽圓). It was
just okay as I am not a big fan of taro ball anyway. The soup was really watery
though.
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| Continue walking! |
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| 3 dogs models! |
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| Getting our Taro |
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| Too waterly for me |
We continued on to the famous postcard spot of the building that inspired the Japanese anime movie “Spirit Away”. The building - Ah Mei Tea House (阿妹茶酒館) was indeed gorgeous with all the lanterns.
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| Going down! |
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| Here we are!!! |
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| At the Entrance! |
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| Yet this is still the Iconic angle! |
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| Sammy wants to take a pic too! |
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| Lots of Stairs!!!!!!!!! |
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| An Old Cinema? |
Up we went to more stairs to reach another famous
taro dessert place – Ah Gan Yee (阿柑姨竽圓). This
place also provided beautiful view to the sea BUT it was pitch dark now!
*facepalm* Anyway the taro ball dessert here seemed to be nicer than the
previous stall. At least they have huge red bean and nice soup.
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| Going Up again! |
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| This Stall is Nicer! |
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| Look at this!!! |
We bought a bowl of meatball soup this time from Ah
Ying Red Yeast Meatball (阿英紅糟肉圓). We did not order the famous original
huge meatball though as we were simply too full. The meatball soup we ordered
was normal meatball size and its texture was really dense.
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| At Ah Ying Red Yeast Meatball |
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| Our Meatball Soup |
Apparently the shops there closed at 8pm or 8.30pm
at the latest so most of the shops were closed by then. We bought some tea egg (茶叶蛋) in last
minute and went back to Uncle Fish Ball (魚丸伯仔) to takeaway another bowl of dried glass noodle (乾冬粉) since we loved it so much!
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| Big Pot of Tea Eggs! |
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| We got our Tea Egg!! Mission Accomplished! |
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| Nom Nom! |
There
was a long queue at the bus station and we waited there for quite some time and
ended up devouring our tea egg. It had its own different flavor but we still preferred
the tea egg at Sun Moon Lake though (link).
A matter of personal taste I suppose. =P
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| Queueing again! |
There was actually bus directly from Jiufen to
Taipei but we did not get on it as it was too full. We ended up getting on the
bus to RuiFang (瑞芳) instead
and changed another bus there back to Taipei. Anyway, our original plan was to
visit Ji Long Night Market (基隆夜市) after Jiufen but we ended up
abandoning the idea since we were too tired and too full with foods! The bus stopped near SOGO in Taipei so we took MRT
back to Ximending again. Btw, one of the bus stops before this final stop was Raohe Night Market (饒河街觀光夜市) so one might wanted to disembark there!
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| A Cartier Xmas Tree!!! |
We ate the dried glass noodle in our hotel room – it was still yummy even though it was cold! Slurp!
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| Eating Dried Glass Noodle again! |
Since this would be our last night in Taiwan, we’d
decided to explore Ximending (西门町) and to eat as much food as possible! LOL!!! We bought
the bubble tea (青蛙下蛋) and & Lemon Aiyu (柠檬爱玉)
from “哇!青蛙下蛋” again. We also bought Mongag Chicken (艋舺雞排)
which happened to be located right beside the bubble tea shop. The texture of
this deep fried chicken was completely different from other deep fried chicken
we ate in Taiwan – the outer layer was unbelievably crispy until you thought
you were eating some crunchy nacho!
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| Our Drinks! |
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| Let's try this shop! |
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| Crunchy Chicken! |
Our last
purchase was this bitter gourd juice (苦瓜汁) from lemon house (檸檬屋正宗苦瓜原汁)
– the reason it caught our eyes was the long queue! Anyway we didn’t like it
since we were not really fan of bitter gourd anyway. After all the foods, we
finally bid goodbye to our last night in Taiwan. =)
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| Queueing for Bitter Gourd Juice.. =P |
Next Day (Last Minute Food Hunting & Time to go home)
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